Although they both fell short of advancing to state tournament berths, the 2008 baseball and softball seasons have left their mark on the Lakota East record books. Both programs recently finished their campaigns with regional runner up titles.

It was the baseball teams first appearance in a regional championship losing to Archbishop Moeller in 8 innings on Friday. A sharp line drive that just eluded 2 nd baseman Evin Duslod was all the separated the Hawks from a trip to the Final Four. The Hawks season ended with an overall record of 18-12 and their first ever District Championship.

On Saturday the softball team lost 3-0 to GMC foe Mason, suffering one bad inning when the Comets got all their runs. It was the Lady Hawks first regional title game after three previous semi-final appearances. The girls finished with an overall season record of 22-8 and their 3 rd District Championship.

The baseball team loses 10 seniors to graduation, but will have a strong core of underclassman returnees next season. The softball team graduated only 5 seniors and will return starting pitcher, Hillary Ballinger, catcher, Emily Lafferty, along with 8 returning letter winners including 6 starters.

Adam Thomas will be stepping into some “new shoes” this coming fall. The former Fairfield High School track and cross country standout will not just be slipping into his usual size 11 ½ running shoes. Thomas has been selected to replace Lakota coaching legend, Jason Lindsey (a.k.a. Dr. of Distance) as East's new head cross country coach. Lindsey announced his retirement last season after a Lakota and Lakota East coaching career that spanned some 30 years.

“Finding a replacement for someone like Jason was not an easy task,” said East AD Jim Rouff. “Adam has been a highly successful athlete both interscholastically and collegiately. Along with his recent high school coaching experience we expect our cross country program to continue to perform well under his leadership.”more

Lakota East junior Megan Scheitlin did it again! Scheitlin shattered the Lakota East pole vault record with leap of 10 feet at Wednesday nights District Track Championships at Fairfield High School. It was her record to break as she set the previous mark of 9 feet at last year's Coaches Classic.

"Megan has been very consistent, but kind of frustrated lately because she wasn't seeing the improvement that she desired,” said East pole vaulting coach Jeff Combs.  “Most of this was due to a pole that was getting to weak for her.  We borrowed poles from the Elder coach that fit her better and she was soaring." Combs added that he believes Megan could add another foot to the record at next weeks regional meet, which would qualify her for State.

Scheitlin finished 2nd at the District meet qualifying her for the Regional competition on Friday, May 30 th.

The Lakota East Softball program won their third District title in the last four years with their 2-0 victory over Glen Este last Saturday at Fairfield Middle School. East also won back-to-back District Championships in 2005 and 2006.

The Hawks made a pair of bases loaded walks in the 1 st inning stand up as East pitcher Hillary Ballinger shut down the Trojan offense. more

The Lakota East baseball program entered uncharted territory with their 4-0 win against the Centerville Elks on Thursday. With their sweet victory in the district finals they will now advance to a regional semi-final matchup with Vandalia Butler. “We're going to enjoy this for now and then start preparing for next week,” said East head coach Ray Hamilton. “Our kids believed in this and that's why it happened.” more

Its now official, Jim Lehman will become the new head coach of the Lakota East Wrestling Program. The Lakota School Board approved Lehman's hiring at their recent monthly meeting. Lehman will succeed Bob Latessa who began the East program when the district split into two high schools 11 years ago. Lehman has been an assistant under Latessa for the past 10 seasons and also teaches in the Business Department at East. “My goal is to continue to build upon the amazingly strong foundation that Latessa has built over the past 10 years,” said Lehman. “I want to not only develop outstanding wrestlers and outstanding wrestling teams at East, but I want to develop outstanding young men. That has always been what East Wrestling is about, and that is going to remain our top priority.” more

Todd Benzinger was formally approved at the Lakota School Districts board meeting on Monday evening. He becomes the program's 3 rd head coach following the tenures of Cindy Feltman (6 seasons) and Dave Honhart (5 seasons).

Benzinger most recently guided the Loveland High School girl's program to a record of 30-12 over the past two seasons (17-4 in 2007-08). From 1999-2006 he was the head coach for the Seven Hills girl's basketball team that went 122-47 with 5 Sectional Championships and 2 District Championships. Benzinger played major league baseball for 9 seasons with the Boston Red Sox, Cincinnati Reds, KC Royals, LA Dodgers and SF Giants. Most notably Benzinger was a member of the 1990 World Champion Cincinnati Reds that went “wire-to-wire”. He will long be remembered by fans in the Cincinnati area for catching a foul pop-up at first base that clinched the Red's sweep over the Oakland Athletics. East Athletic Director Jim Rouff was also part of that team as the Red's strength and conditioning coach. ” more